Oct. 8, 2012
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Royal Caribbean's 2,139-passenger Radiance of the Seas. / Royal Caribbean

by Gene Sloan, USA TODAY

by Gene Sloan, USA TODAY

What's it like to sail on a Royal Caribbean ship? USA TODAY's cruise review site, VacationCruisesInfo.com, offers a glimpse this week in an in-depth review of the line's Radiance of the Seas.

At 67 pages, it's the most extensive appraisal ever of the 2,139-passenger Radiance of the Seas to be posted online, and it includes more than 1,000 photos showing nearly every interior and exterior space of the ship.

Overall, the reviewer gave the Radiance of the Seas good marks, calling it "an attractive and versatile ship, designed to cater to a wide variety of guests." But not everything about the vessel drew praise. The reviewer's cabin wasn't completely ready for prime time, and while there was a bounty of extra-charge restaurants, many of them were "unexceptional," the reviewer notes.

The reviewer also criticized the large number of add-on costs at venues around the ship, which "can put a real damper on a (voyage) ... by the end of our cruise we started to think of Royal Caribbean as the nickel-and-dime line."

Visit VacationCruisesInfo.com to view the full Radiance of the Seas review, which was written by one of the site's in-house, anonymous reviewers. As with all VacationCruisesInfo.com reviews, the reviewer traveled on the vessel incognito and at USA TODAY's expense.

Launched in October 2011, VacationCruisesInfo.com was designed in collaboration with Reviewed.com, a network of online review publications recently acquired by USA TODAY, and it's devoted to helping would-be cruisers find the perfect ship.

VacationCruisesInfo.com is the first cruise review site to use anonymous reviewers. Unlike reviewers at other sites, VacationCruisesInfo.com reviewers never will travel on free cruises provided by cruise lines, nor will they base their reviews on cruise line-arranged "preview" or "press" cruises for travel writers or any other sailing where their presence on a ship is known.